A&P Are any of you guys on stock photography sites?

I work as an advertising art director so I'm constantly having to use stock photography for a lot of my projects, and I was wondering if maybe doing some of my own stock photos on the side might not be a bad idea? I've gotten a couple invitations over the past couple months to join certain smaller ones, anyone have any experience with it?

You post a picture which is likely to be used in some sort of publication or other pay per use type situation and basically everytime a person downloads your picture you get like $0.25.

So lets say for instance you take a picture of your abnormally small junk...100 people download your junk picture to use as an advertisment for penis pumps. You get $25 and your cock pics get spammed to millions via e-mail.

You post a picture which is likely to be used in some sort of publication or other pay per use type situation and basically everytime a person downloads your picture you get like $0.25.

So lets say for instance you take a picture of your abnormally small junk...100 people download your junk picture to use as an advertisment for penis pumps. You get $25 and your cock pics get spammed to millions via e-mail.

For your run of the mill royalty free images its like 200-500 like you said, to have exclusive rights its more like in the thousands to a rediculous amount...I interned at an ad agency that sometimes said fuck it and took their own pictures instead of paying $4k for exclusive rights to a picture of some girl smiling next to a beach ball.

you have to know what you're doing, really well to do anything with stock.

you have to know what gets bought as to what to shoot. you can't just send pics to corbet or getty. you need to research which ones work with those companies to get you into the getty system. if you aren't in a big system, you won't get anything purchased. they all pay different amounts, have different requirements, (some require a 1ds or better images) and they have different contracts for you. nothing like submitting a pic of a family member and it ends up as the next aids or cigraette or viagra ad. they require different levels of model and propert releases.

You have to know which agency to join. no point in joining anything that pays you less that $50 a pic. all these idiots selling off their stuff for .50 just kill the market. why pay ful dollar when you can pay 50 for a dvd's worth of pics.

so basically unless you plan on making photography a full time job, stay away.

you have to know what you're doing, really well to do anything with stock.

you have to know what gets bought as to what to shoot. you can't just send pics to corbet or getty. you need to research which ones work with those companies to get you into the getty system. if you aren't in a big system, you won't get anything purchased. they all pay different amounts, have different requirements, (some require a 1ds or better images) and they have different contracts for you. nothing like submitting a pic of a family member and it ends up as the next aids or cigraette or viagra ad. they require different levels of model and propert releases.

You have to know which agency to join. no point in joining anything that pays you less that $50 a pic. all these idiots selling off their stuff for .50 just kill the market. why pay ful dollar when you can pay 50 for a dvd's worth of pics.

so basically unless you plan on making photography a full time job, stay away.

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great points. Like I said, I use stock photo sites day in and day out for my projects, and a lot of stuff I find I can be doing easily and much better. For example, healthcare photos, etc.

The importance of being on a stock photo site that is reputable and pays well is essential I can see that, the more traffic, the more chances of your photos being bought.

I don't think you necessarily need to depend on photography as a source of income to be an active participant in stock photography sites. That's ignorant.

you have to dvpote a lot of time to it. you can't just take pics and expect them to sell.

say you take a pic or your friend doing something athletic, and nike turns to buy it, but wait, they're wearing addidas clothing. so you basically always have to make everything as generic as possible, shoot with all different crops and orientations, some with room for a header and some without. etc plus the whole contract thing is a bitch. who wants to always walk around with model releases in their pocket and worry about getting property releases.

it can be done as a side job, but only for certain people. my point is more that the average enthusuast shouldn't waste their time trying to get into a very specific form of photography

you have to depote a lot of time to it. you can't just take pics and expect them to sell.

say you take a pic or your friend doing somethign athletic, and nike turns to buy it, but wait, their wearing addidas clothing. so you basically always have to make everything as generic as possible, shoot with all different crops and orientations, some with room for a header and some without. etc plus the whole contract thing is a bitch. who wants to always walk around with model releases in their pocket and worry about getting property releases.

it can be done as a side job, but only for certain people. my point is more that the average enthusuast shouldn't waste their time trying to get into a very specific form of photography

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terrific points.

I guess I was just disappointed by such a blanket statement:

so basically unless you plan on making photography a full time job, stay away.

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but I would tend to agree, the average enthusiast that just takes photographs for the sake of photography should probably keep away. Doing shoots for the intent to sell on the other hand...

if you can do something with them, then great. the problem is for people that don't meet the requirements of a larger firm, then go to these places and load all their crap into places that may a quarter an image, and that kills the market for everyone else.

if anyone actually wants to study up on it and do it right, i'd totally encourage that, but less and less people are doing that these days